Flint resident on 20/20 Unplugged for apparent role in Nigerian puppy scam

FLINT, MI -- A Flint woman who was on national television
because of her involvement in a Nigerian puppy scam would like to team up with
those she helped bilk out of cash in attempts to stamp out similar enterprises.

Flint resident Getrude Marshall was on ABC's 20/20 for her part in a Nigerian puppy scam. Mlive File Photo

Flint resident Gertrude
Marshall was part of a Nigerian puppy scam where people who thought they were
buying a dog online would send her money.

The customers would never get the dog
and Marshall would cash the money orders, keep a portion for herself and send
the rest to her boyfriend in Nigeria.

Marshall was on
ABC's "20/20 Unplugged" Friday, Dec. 7, after she was contacted by
the show the day before, she said.

People would call a number listed in an online advertisement for getting a
puppy online. The customer would send the money and the dog would be delivered
to an airport of their choice, the scam promised.

The money would get sent to Marshall, but a puppy was never delivered.

"I was gullible," she told 20/20. "I was stupid."

Marshall said she met Jimmy Miller online and the two started a relationship.

After a year of chatting online, he asked Marshall to start helping him with
his electronics business.

"Eventually I fell in love," Marshall told MLive-Flint Journal.

He would send her money orders and she would cash them, take a little for
herself and send the money to Nigeria.

Marshall estimates she was sent between $50,000 and $70,000 in MoneyGrams and
Western Union wires. Every time she cashed one of the money orders, she would
keep between $100 and $200.

Approximately $4,000 total was pocketed by Marshall, according to figures she
provided based on a bag full of receipts of the transactions.

"I asked him three or four times, 'Are you sure you haven't got me into
something illegal?'" she said.

As part of 20/20's investigation, Marshall's name came up in a search for
ordering a puppy online.

When the show contacted her, Marshall agreed to turn
all her passwords over to the show in order to confront her online boyfriend.

"Jimmy, why you look so surprised?" Anchor Chris Cuomo asks when
Jimmy goes online to chat with who he thought was Marshall. "You're
running a scam and you got caught."

The man immediately ends the chat.

"I was hurt. I was angry," Marshall said after learning of the scam.
"I was stuck because this is somebody I was caring for and he did me like
this."

No law enforcement agencies have contacted Marshall, who said she is sorry for
anyone who lost money in the scam.

She said she continued cashing the money orders because she needed the money
and the man kept reassuring her it was legitimate.

"I just started using the Internet last year," Marshall said. "I
didn't know about scams until I got caught up in them."

She wants to collaborate with anyone who sent her money, and hopes to
collaborate with the victims to go before Congress.

"One day I hope I'll be able to stand before Congress and tell them our
stories and ask them to stop this," Marshall said. "I'm sorry that it
happened. I didn't know it was going on. If I would've known, I would've
returned their money to them."